4 ounces hulled pumpkin seeds (also known as pepitas. Do not use the unhulled seeds that come out of a standard jack-o-lantern)

1. Crank the oven to 325°F.

2. Take the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, and salt for a spin in your food processor, then move them to a large mixing bowl.

3. Spin the sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla in the processor, pulsing just a few times to bring everything together. Dump the goo right on top of the dry team and stir to combine. (Don’t worry if there are a few lumps.)

4. Install the food processor’s shredding blade and shred the pumpkin in the food processor. Dump onto a kitchen towel and twist into a ball to wring out as much water as possible (within reason) – oh, and do this over the sink. Fold the pumpkin and the pumpkin seeds into the batter using a large rubber spatula, or better yet, your hand.

5. Pour into a 9x5x3″ loaf pan or standard nonstick muffin pan, filling the latter two thirds full. (If your only loaf pan is not nonstick – i.e., it’s a “stick” pan, lightly butter it and dust with flour.)

6. Bake the loaf for 1 hour and 15 minutes to 1 1/2 hours, or until an internal temperature of 200° to 210°F is reached. Cool for 15 minutes in the pan, then turn out onto a cooling rack. Cool completely. If making muffins, bake them for 30 minutes, and remove from the muffin tin to a cooling rack immediately.

Yield: 1 9-inch loaf or a dozen muffins

From: Good Eats: The Early Years by Alton Brown

Katie: I really wanted to make pumpkin bread from scratch with a real pumpkin. So I looked through my cookbooks and didn’t find one until I came across this recipe. I had not ever thought about making it with shredded pumpkin, because I had in my head that it would require roasting the pumpkin and pureeing it. I thought it was worth a try! When I saw that it didn’t require a lot of pumpkin to make and didn’t make a huge amount, I decided to make two batches. One version like the recipe above (except that I didn’t have pepitas), and another version with roasted, pureed pumpkin (see picture below). For the roasting part of the process, I followed these instructions by Alton Brown, except I rubbed olive oil on the outside of the pumpkin skin so it wouldn’t burn. Both versions were delicious, although I preferred the result I got by following the recipe more than the other. The batter was a little like carrot cake, but I think the shredded pumpkin baked even better than shredded carrots. When it was hot out of the oven, the shredded pumpkin bits were a little like buttery pumpkin morsels that melted in my mouth! What could be better than that?!

Gray: I think both versions were delicious, but I liked the version with the shredded pumpkin better than the one with the pureed pumpkin. It was delicious right from the oven. Both kept well and we were able to share them with several groups of people, but If you can serve them fresh definitely do it. Enjoy!